Hiatus Gifting This Unfortunate Guy With Blessings

"What a massive crowd! Hello Megumin, Kazuki."

"Hello, Darkness."

"Good morning."

Suddenly Darkness appeared behind us and we exchanged greetings. It was my first time seeing her without her armor on. It was completely shattered by how Darkness 'bravely' took every hit she could.

When I looked at the number of people waiting to receive their rewards for Cabbage Hunt I sighed deeply while imagining a couple of hours of waiting in line.

"Any adventurers wanting to accept quest please come over to me!"

Suddenly, an unknown to me Receptionist-san yelled out of one of the stations. Adventurers inside the guild only briefly scanned her station and resumed to excitedly talk while standing in lines to other counters to get their money.

Normally there would be at least a few people occupying the queue towards the counter that handed quests but today not even a single soul tried walking up to the lady Receptionist,

"No one is taking any quests today?" I asked confusedly while looking at the quest bulletin board just bursting with pieces of paper.

"It happens every year. After the harvest quest adventurers usually take their time free using the money they easily received from hunting cabbages. Guild workers usually call the day after the harvest a Hell Day and the following week a Lull."

Darkness calmly answered but Megumin contrary to Darkness's attitude looked at me nervously.

"We aren't taking a day off, right? Let's go and-"

"WHY?!"

There was a sudden shout coming directly from the front of the line. The guild got a little bit less rowdy upon hearing a commotion because everybody wanted seemed to enjoy some drama.

"I worked so hard! Why do I only get 200,000 Eris when Kazuma is getting over 1, 000, 000?!"

"Ms. Adventurer I already checked…"

"This has to be a mistake! Check agai-"

"Stop bothering innocent guild's staff, you sore loser of an Archpriest!"

"This is weird! Extremely weird! Why did you only capture high-class cabbage when I mostly got not even a cabbage but lettuce! Why would they fly towards this shitty NEET instead of me, an otherworld-class beauty?!"

"They probably smelled out your foul personality and-!"

"HEY, MOVE IT! THERE ARE PEOPLE WAITING IN THE LINE!"

"Sorry…" x2

A guy easily more than 2 meters tall with a muscular build seemed fed up with two rookies complaining and holding up a line for everyone else.

"..." x3

Darkness, Megumin, and I watched as our two other party members started quietly walking away with their heads hung down under the pressure of dozens of cold stares coming from other adventurers.

I also saw a few adventurers drinking at the bar looking with jealousy towards Kazuma after hearing about his prize and scrutinize him with a cold gleam in their eyes, probably wondering how a small guy like he got a reward bigger than them.

"Oh, it's you guys."

Kazuma finally spotted us standing near the end of the queue.

"You are going to wait?"

He asked us with pity in his eyes while looking at the gargantuan line in front of us.

"We can take out our reward at a later date, right?"

I asked Darkness as she seemed to be somewhat knowledgable about many subjects regarding the guild.

"Yes, there should be no problem with that."

"Then I will come another day for it."

Megumin also seemed unconcerned about receiving the reward that day. Darkness, on the other hand, fidgeted and said:

"I wouldn't get much anyway, so I can wait too."

"What do you mean? Kazuma got over a million and even Aqua got 200,000 Eris. You will surely get something."

Megumin tried lifting up Darkness's spirit but she only got more fl.u.s.tered. Megumin who was completely focused on cabbages to find a perfect moment to use her Explosion and then slept through the rest of the event didn't see Darkness's 'display of skill'.

Megumin only saw the aftermath - Darkness lying nearly unconscious on the ground so Megumin probably thought Darkness did a killing in that event.

"I didn't catch even one…"

"..." x3

Megumin fell silent, understandably confused. Meanwhile, Aqua and Kazuma looked in a completely different direction and were pretending to not hear anything. It seemed that the guilt of using Darkness as a meatshield was eating at their consciousness.

"Then how many cabbages have you killed?"

Megumin continued trying to find any logical answer but once again Darkness seemed adamant on shattering her expectations.

"Four…"

It was my time to be surprised. I was observing Darkness throughout the event and she never tried retaliating against those flying green balls and just took them on with her body. Did those four cabbages die after bull-rushing against her armor or something?

"What is your level, by the way?"

Kazuma suddenly asked Darkness and she progressively went from slightly embarrassed to red tomato level of embarrassed. After a few seconds she muttered:

"I am level 5…"

Considering Darkness's previous encounters I've seen it was probably safe to assume that she was probably only receiving attacks and never attacking herself so it wasn't that surprising that her level was lower than mine.

Kazuma fell silent for a moment and then asked the rest of us the same question.

"15!" Megumin straightened her back and proudly exclaimed.

"I am at level 10." I answered when I saw Kazuma and Aqua hesitating.

"I am also at 10." Kazuma breathed a sigh of relief and shared his level as well.

We all then looked at Aqua who started quietly backing out when she heard Kazuma's level. When she saw us looking in her way she tried bolting away but realizing the reason Kazuma quickly turned around and reached out his hand while shouting:

"STEAL!"

Darkness suddenly had a very expectant look on her face but it quickly changed back to normal when she saw a rectangular shape in Kazuma's hand.

"HEY! Give it back!"

Kazuma only looked at his spoils for a second and then threw Aqua's adventurer card at her while saying:

"Pfffttt. We have a level 3 rookie Archpriest in our party."

And he burst out with laughter.

"You can only talk big because you are a lowly Adventurer that has a handicap of leveling faster!"

"I am sorry, what? I can't hear you from up here! Get on my level first before talking!"

I realized that I haven't seen Aqua attack anything besides the cabbages yesterday indeed.

Darkness quickly chimed in:

"Kazuma, don't bully Aqua so much. She's an Archpriest. It's our team's job to help her level up!"

"What is that, Ms. Low-Level-Crusader?"

I saw Darkness reel back with a kinda happy expression on her face after hearing Kazuma's remark.

With how EXP was handed out Darkness was completely right. A team's supporter has to support his team but the team also has to remember to support the supporter. Aqua could probably level very fast if we took some undead related quest.

But what about Darkness? She literally drops her weapon and tanks the damage. Even when she attacked my goblin form right after I arrived in this world she only just swung the sword around without it going anywhere near me. How can you help level someone like that?

Right as I got an idea I saw Aqua's expression change as well.

"Who cares about level anyway. I am perfectly fine as is. Even level 50 Archpriest wouldn't be nearly as good as me!"

Aqua ignored confused faces of adventurers standing around her and kept her 'victory pose' for a few seconds before she said:

"Anyways… I worked hard yesterday so I want a day off!"

Something seemed fishy about her declaration but before Megumin could object, Kazuma said:

"I have to agree with low-level Aqua too. I am still tired after yesterday and I wanted to do something about my current housing dilemma since I have all this money. I hope you don't mind."

"I do mind! What about the rest of our-!"

Megumin tried interjecting but Kazuma and Aqua didn't seem to register it. Aqua was occupied with looking at Kazuma with a worried expression and then she asked him:

"You meant OUR housing dilemma, right?"

"I will magnanimously let you have that blanket I won in yesterday's bet. Hahaha."

"Kazuma-san-!"

And then Kazuma started walking away from us while Aqua stayed right beside him and asking him questions to which he didn't answer.

"So rude! He walked away without answering me! Maybe I should show him the power of my Explosion up-close and personal."

Megumin exclaimed angrily with her eyes starting to glow crimson while looking at the duo leaving the guild.

"How despicable~"

I sighed deeply after hearing Darkness's way of describing Kazuma. It sounded like a compliment when she toned it like that.

After thinking for a few seconds I asked:

"Darkness, are you up for a quest even without your armor? We could take some easy one-"

"Yes! I don't need my armor and it doesn't have to be an easy quest…"

She strained her eyes to look up the quest board and continued:

"...how about the One-Punch Bear-!"

"Rejected."

The weird smile Darkness had on her face vanished instantly but I didn't mind it and explained to her my plan for today. I saw Darkness become a little bit serious and then she nodded affirmatively. Megumin wasn't exactly thrilled either after hearing it but easily agreed when I mentioned a peculiar idea to her.

With the majority of adventurers waiting for their Cabbage Hunt rewards or lazying around after getting them, there were lots of easy quests still on the board. I picked up a Goblin Extermination quest and proceeded to the totally empty counter for the quest takers.

Lady Receptionist choked on her drink when she saw us with a quest at her desk. It took her a few seconds to stop coughing but after 5 minutes we were already heading towards the Northern City Gate.

When we half a kilometer outside of the city I stopped and asked Megumin in a serious tone:

"Are you ready?"

"Yes!" An excited yell came out of her mouth right before I changed into my Young Griffin form.

It was the first time Megumin had a calm and long look at my most powerful transformation. Well, calm was the wrong word for describing her reaction. Megumin looked like a kid who saw a Santa Claus for the first time.

I even made a super cool - in my opinion - pose by standing on my hind lion's legs, opening my wings as wide as possible and scratching the air with my front eagle-like talons. Even Darkness seemed amazed at how cool I looked.

"I wonder how those talons would feel when-"

I take that back.

When Megumin calmed down after a few minutes of looking around every nook and cranny of my form I released a silent eagle cry to tell them to hop on.

Although I couldn't fly anywhere near as fast as I did with only Megumin in my claws, the journey towards our destination was shortened easily by hours. Neither Megumin nor Darkness seemed to appreciate that fact because both of them were awestruck by the scenery from the above.

"Let us fly some more!"

"Yeah! The fear of falling down is just-"

Was their reaction when I landed and transformed into my human form.

"After we are done here. We are already at our destination. Darkness, be ready. Megumin, please look around and shout if you spot something. And don't fire of Explosion immediately!"

"I wouldn't do that!"

I tried hard not to look at Megumin with confusion after hearing her answer before I changed back into my Young Griffin form and took flight once again.

It didn't take me even half a minute to find and grab the first goblin from the forest. I caught it between my talons and held it firmly in place, no matter how it struggled. I then came back to the clearing in which Darkness stood waiting with her sword drawn and I released a goblin in front of her.

"Now Darkness!"

Coach Megumin shouted at Darkness.

"O-okay!"

Darkness swung her sword right in front of her but missed the timing and the Goblin crashed right under her feet. It g.r.o.a.n.e.d painfully with few of his bones probably shattered from the fall.

"This somehow feels wrong…"

"Finish it!"

Coach Megumin once again yelled out instructions.

"Mmmmm!" Darkness bit her lip, swung her sword down and… missed.

"HOW?!"

"I told you my aim is terrible!"

I was observing the spectacle from above and I couldn't believe what I just saw. Darkness managed to miss an unmoving target right in front of her. Then I saw Darkness take up her sword once again and… miss again.

'Eris-sama, I need godly assistance here.' is the thought I had at that moment.

(A/N: Hello. Unfortunately, I won't be able to write a chapter tomorrow because I have a lot of stuff going on on Wednesdays. See you guys on Thursday!)